Prosecutors couldn't explain today how two Allentown police officers survived a shootout with a city man in 2012 after he fired 24 shots at them with an AR-15.

It was a miracle officers Ronald Schlegel and Robert Carbaugh weren't killed by Del Fenty, they said. It was luck.

"In this case they were so lucky they were able to go home," Lehigh County First Assistant District Attorney Steven Luksa said.

Judge William Ford said that in all the years he has served on the bench, the Fenty case was the closest he has come to an officer being killed.

"The community truly needs to be protected from Mr. Fenty. You are a dangerous man," Ford said before sentencing him to 26 years to 52 years in state prison for two counts of attempted homicide, and single counts of illegal firearm possession and simple assault.

Fenty pleaded guilty to the charges in the middle of his October trial. In exchange for the plea, prosecutors dropped two counts of assaulting a law enforcement officer and single counts of harassment and making terroristic threats.

Both officers said in court they were thankful for everyone involved in the case, from the first responders to the officers who investigated the crime. There were dozens of law enforcement officers in the courtroom audience today.

"I just want to thank them for myself and for my family," Schlegel said.

Fenty, wearing a suit, tie and shackles, said he recognized he would be punished and that he was ashamed of what happened.

"I'm truly sorry," he said. "I just wish this had never happened."

But Luksa said Fenty has never said that he saw the police officers and knowingly shot at them.

On the day of the shootout, Fenty assaulted his wife
and threatened to kill her and officers if she called police. When
officers went into Fenty's house and identified themselves, Fenty
started firing.

Schlegel testified he drew
his gun when Fenty started shooting and eventually fired 11 shots in
return. Both Schlegel and officer Robert Carbaugh suffered minor injuries and later returned to
work.

Fenty escaped the house out the back and fled to New York, where authorities arrested him three days after the shootout.

Luksa
previously said police found an "arsenal" in the house, including five
hand grenades, three smoke grenades, two pistols, a handgun, two pellet
guns, a workshop with a partially dismantled gun, and ammunition and
magazines on different floors.

In court today, Chvon Fenty said her husband had stopped drinking for years but started drinking again in the weeks before the shootout. She said her husband started behaving differently and "he just changed."

Chvon Fenty said she still loves her husband and plans to stay married to him.

"Enough has happened to him," she said. "I'm glad he's still alive. ... He's not a monster. I do not know what happened."

At the end of the hearing, a woman asked the judge if Del Fenty's 80-year-old mother could hug her son. The judge said that due to security concerns, she could not.